Build-Your-Own-Stardrive Chart

[CRMcNeill]

So, I recently picked up a copy of GG6: Tramp Freighters, 1st. Edition. It wasn't cheap, but it was worth it, as it cleared up several discrepancies I'd found in GG6 2E. The biggest was a misconception I have run into with some gamers regarding the disposition of the original engine once you install an after-market one from the GG6 list. More than one person has argued that you don't lose the weight of the original engine, even though you are removing it and installing a completely new engine in its place. I only recently found the paragraph that disproves it.

GG6 2E, pg. 38, left column, bottom paragraph reads:

"During the campaign, when replacing one device with a new one, adjust the ship's cargo capacity accordingly (subtract the weight of the first device and then add the weight of the second),"

The problem, then, is that the 2E book does not give the weight of the stock engine, just the weight of a specific after-market drive from the list. The original 1E gave a listing of Speed Codes (1D through 7D) with weight and cost included, but there was no mention of illegality or availability, so a starship captain (if he could come up with 1 million credits) could install a Space 14 drive in his ship. Personally, I don't have a problem with this (one of my favorite internet guidebooks, SWSRC's Blockade Runner's Guide, featured a highly illegal Space 14 drive, and included sufficient backstory to support the idea), so long as the drive is sufficiently expensive and illegal, but WEG did away with the stock Space 14 drive when they upgraded to 2E. Interestingly enough, under the 2E rules, you can get a drive as high as Space 16, if you are willing to accept the potential mishaps.

But I digress...

Having read the Starship Modification chapters of GG6 in both 1E and 2E, I find that there are things I like and dislike about both, so I started thinking about ways I could combine the two. I have a lot of ideas, but the one that stands out most is the idea of what amounts to a Build-Your-Own-Stardrive Chart. In essence, what I would like to do is start with a basic chart that lists drives by speed class, weight, cost, availability, etc. To modify a drive above and beyond that, there would be application templates (similar to the starship templates in the Starship of the Galaxy Saga Edition book). Each template would alter the drive's performance and provide a little more background and detail as to the engine itself. A partial list of possible templates includes:

Archaic - An older design, higher availability, less expensive, but also less capable
Commercial - A civilian drive designed to sacrifice speed and performance for increased cargo capacity and range
Junker - A unique engine design pieced together from multiple sources
Military - An expensive and illegal design with better performance than the available civilian drives
Performance - A civilian drive designed for high speed at the expense of consumables (and reliability, to a degree)
Precision - A high-end drive constructed to higher standards of reliability than stock
Prototype - An advanced unique design with greater capabilities, but also unknown faults
Specialized - A drive designed specifically for use with a specific brand of vessel, such as CEC or SoroSuub. Increased difficulty for installation and modification when installed in a ship that is not made by the listed manufacturer.

These are just the ones I have been able to come up with on my own; I'm sure there are other possibilities. Anyway, the idea is that a ship owner who wishes to upgrade his drive will select the speed that he wants and then select the appropriate templates that modify the drive. For example, if a starship captain wants a Space 8 drive, but doesn't quite have the credits to pay for it stock, he can select the Archaic and Junker templates to bring the price down, at the expense of reduced operational reliability once the drive is installed. Alternately, a captain with credits to spare could buy a Space 8 drive, with the Specialized and Precision templates to get increased reliability and higher consumables.

At this point, this is mostly just a random concept, as my current job doesn't give me a lot of time to think deeply on gaming. I'm interested to hear what you all think...
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Bren]

I'd substitute a different word for Archaic as I tend to think of an archaic drive as something - like a roman ballista in today's world - as something no longer in general use or production and hence very expensive despite being less effective than a more modern device.

Maybe "out-of-date" or "prior version" instead of Archaic.

[CRMcNeill]

Good point. I drew the basis of the template idea from the Saga Edition book, and Archaic was the word they used, so I just stuck with it. Maybe simply "Older" would be sufficient.

As a side note, applying templates could also help the GM flesh out the story a bit more, as in "Well, we have a Space 8 drive available, but I'm not sure you want it..."
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[CRMcNeill]

On a related note, I'm considering adding more steps to the hyperdrive chart. Officially, once you get above x2, every technology step introduces a 100% increase in drive speed, while real technology seems to make smaller, more incremental steps to speed increases. So, rather than hyperdrive modifiers of x2, x 1, x1/2, etc, the upper end of the chart would look something like x2, x1.5, x1, x.75, x.67, x.5, (maybe even a x.33 or x.25) where the speed steps are closer together, as is the competition for fastest ship in the galaxy
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Bren]

I stick to multiples of .25 (so now 2/3 or 1/3 speeds for me) but the idea makes sense and I think I have seen stats for a WEG ship customized freighter that had a .75 hyperdrive.

[jmanski]

I think the Outrider had a .75
_________________
Blasted rules. Why can't they just be perfect?

[thedemonapostle]

[atgxtg]

I have been building my own stardrive chart.

I was wondering though just what sort or mass ranges do people think the Star Wars ships are at? What is the general consensus on what they think a starfighter should mass, what a freighter should and so forth.

I got something that seems to work with most of what exists already, but would love to see what other people think the masses should be for things like X-Wings and TIE fighters before I lock anything down.

Any chance of finding some common ground?

[CRMcNeill]

I'm not sure what you mean by mass, but IMO, you may be overcomplicating it. The simplest way to calculate the mass of a starship would likely be just using its hull dice, but there are some obvious flaws there. However, if you are just looking for simplicity, then that would be the way to go.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[thedemonapostle]

example of real world vehicles

Economy - geo metro
Commercial - ford f-150/ram 1500/chevy 1500/box truck
Customized - modified vehicles, like from the fast and the furious 1
Military - HMMWV, LMTV, MRAP, etc
Performance - Ferrari's, Lamborghini's, etc
Precision - Rolls Royce, Bentley, Aston Martin, etc
Prototype - any kind of brand new, experimental vehicle
Specialized - Mazda RX-7, RX-8, Chrysler Turbine Car, MTT Turbine Superbike, steam cars, alternate fuel cell cars, etc





and just a thought, but couldnt mass be roughly calculated by multiplying the length times the width times the hull in pips?
_________________
Aim low, shoot high
I'm a pirate, need I say more?

d6holocron.com: Thedemonapostle

Thedemonapostle Star Wars Crossovers

[CRMcNeill]

On a related note, the 1E book mentions upgraded maneuvering thrusters. To me, thrusters in an advanced sci-fi environment are too low tech. After all, maneuvering thrusters are what modern space craft of today use. If SWU starships mount energy weapons and shields, interstellar drives, sublight drives that generate thousands of g's of acceleration, plus anti-gravity technology sufficient to nullify that force of acceleration, it's a pretty good bet that maneuvering technology has advanced beyond the 20th-century concept of compressed gas. On top of that, maneuvering thrusters do not account for how starships move in the SWU, like atmospheric fighters instead of ships floating in a vacuum.

I think I've mentioned this once before, but since another topic is currently yammering away on railguns and g-forces, I thought of it again. Here's the basic version; since starship technology has mastered gravity sufficiently to use it for flight and to absorb the massive stresses generated by high-speed acceleration, I believe it is also used to maneuver starships, by creating a very powerful, localized "gravity slope" that bends the straight-line course of a starfighter, much like the gravity slingshot technique that gets used off and on in space opera.

The X-Wing novels mention something called an etheric rudder, which is as good a name as any. The way I figure, the ship's drives work like normal, generating forward thrust. When the pilot manipulates his joystick to make the ship turn, he alters the gravity slope affecting his ship, causing the ship's course to bend away from a straight-ahead course, with direction and degree of sharpness dictated by the position of the joystick. The result is that the ship can now turn, bank, climb and dive as though it were operating in atmospheric conditions without shutting off its drives (which is what we see in the films).

When upgrading a ship's maneuvering thrusters, the character is, in essence, buying a more powerful gravity slope generator, which allows the ship to generate steeper gravity slopes (and turn more sharply) and to alter the direction of the gravity slope with greater precision (greater maneuverability when piloting a complicated course).

Thoughts? IMO, using gravity fields to turn a ship seems much more in keeping with the SWU tech level than the basic concept of maneuvering thrusters.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[atgxtg]

[CRMcNeill]

[atgxtg]

[CRMcNeill]

So why not just do separate charts for starfighters, space transports and capital ships? The Saga Edition Starships of the Galaxy Book (and the attendant Rancor Pit Conversion book) included the following rules for converting equipment:

Converting to Snubfighters
Cost: x1.5 (for miniaturization costs)
Space: (# of metric tons) +12 = # of kilograms

Converting to Capital Ships
Cost: x20
Space: (# of metric tons) x20 = # of metric tons
These conversion rules are not necessarily designed to be convert previously existing West End Games supplements, or with equipment described outside of this conversion guide. However, it can serve as a general guideline for installing equipment in this guide in other starship types.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index